


"Hide Me":  or, Why Wilson's Broken Collarbone is All House's Fault

by alternatealto



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Gen, Humor, Sick Wilson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-24
Updated: 2018-02-24
Packaged: 2019-03-23 05:20:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13780566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alternatealto/pseuds/alternatealto
Summary: That apology had better be a really good one.





	"Hide Me":  or, Why Wilson's Broken Collarbone is All House's Fault

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for the 2010 Camp Sick!Wilson Random Items Challenge. The items were ice cream, a remote control, and the Clinic.

 

It truly had been, Wilson thought as he sagged painfully against the elevator wall, One of Those Days.  
    
The annoying thing was that as days went in the life of an oncologist, this one really should have been pretty high up on the list of good ones.  Of course, an oncologist’s definition of a “good day” tends to be that it’s a day when none of his patients dies.   On a  _great_  day, not only does nobody die, but at least one patient goes into remission.    
  
This one hadn’t been great, but it had been good, at least in the no-dead-patients sense.  And actually, it hadn’t been all that bad in other respects, either.    
  
Until.  
  
Until a certain limping twerp arrived in his office about an hour before Wilson was due to head home.  From there, it was all downhill.  
  
“You’ve got to hide me; she’s on the warpath.”  
  
“Here?” Wilson inquired, not looking up from his paperwork.  “Why would you come here to hide?  This is the first place she’ll look.”  
  
“No; I told them when I left that I was going out for ice cream.”  
  
“ ‘Them’?”  Wilson finally looked over to where House sat on his office couch, chin on cane.  
  
“The nurses.”  
  
“The nurses . . . looking after your patient?”  
  
“No, idiot, I don’t  _have_  a patient right now.  Which you would know if you ever took your nose out of your paperwork.”  
  
“So . . . the Clinic nurses, then.”    
  
House nodded.   
  
“You told the Clinic nurses that you were going out for ice cream.  And . . . ?”  
  
“And then I went out.”  
  
“For ice cream.”  
  
“No, just  _out_.  Away.  Far from the madding crowd, and the even more maddening Dean of Medicine.”  
  
“Um . . .”  
  
“What?”  
  
“She can’t be all  _that_  maddening, if the two of you are . . .”  
  
“Are what?  Screwing?  Fooling around?  Doing the nasty?”  
  
“I was  _going_  to say, if the two of you are in a relationship.”  
  
“Prude.  Quit wasting time, she’ll figure out where I am eventually.”  
  
“And you don’t want her to know because . . . ?”  
  
“Because . . . we are, as you say, ‘in a relationship’.”  
  
“O- _kay_.  That makes absolutely no sense at all.”  
  
“She seems to think that she has some kind of leverage over me now that she didn’t have before.”  
  
“Do tell.”  
  
“Before, if I skipped out on my Clinic hours, all I got was more Clinic hours and a chance to look down her blouse while she lectured me about how she needed me to do my job.  Now, I get the lecture, the extra hours,  _and_  another lecture at home about how she can’t afford to play favorites.  And if she’s really pissed, no nookie.  Quit smirking.”  
  
“I’m not.”  
  
“You  _were_.”  
  
“Forgive me if this seems . . . obvious, but wouldn’t the simplest solution be to just do the Clinic hours?”  
  
“It  _would_  be, if . . . ”  
  
“If?”  
  
“If the nurses there didn’t hate me.”  
  
“Ah.  I told you, you needed to watch out if they ever had a chance for revenge.  Looks like they’ve got one.”  
  
“They’re  _sadists_.  All the worst patients are routed straight to whichever exam room I’m in.  But the guy with the remote control stuck in his ass was the last straw.”  
  
Wilson winced.  “What was he doing in the Clinic?  That sounds more like a case for Emergency.”    
  
“The remote wasn’t all that large.  Besides, I think the Emergency nurses are in league with the ones in the Clinic.  All I know is that he ended up on my exam table.”  
  
“Face down, I presume?”  
  
“Cut it out.  And hide me, before she gets here.”  
  
“Would she really be chasing you just because you sneaked out on your Clinic shift again?”  
  
“No, moron, because of what happened with the remote control.  Look, I need you to  _hide_  me, not grill me.”  
  
“My balcony is your balcony.”  
  
“That would be a lot funnier if it wasn’t true.”  
  
“Where else is there for you to go from here?  I’ll re-angle the blinds and tell her I haven’t seen you.  If you sit down in the corner along the wall, you’ll be out of sight from here and from your office balcony.”  
  
“That’s the best you can do?”  
  
“You’re the one who decided to spend ten minutes talking.”  
  
“ _You’re_  the one who kept demanding explanations of everything I told you.”  
  
“Speaking of which, exactly what was it about the remote control that would have her so upset?”  
  
“Turns out, it was still working.”  
  
“How would you know  _that_?  Did he bring his television to the clinic with him, or something?”  
  
“Not his television, his girlfriend.”  
  
“ _What?_ ”  
  
“It seems they’re into mutual auto-eroticism.”    
  
“You mean she . . . she had . . . ?”  
  
“Yup.”  
  
“I’m not sure I want to know any more.”  
  
“Sure you do.  She was in the waiting area, and when I accidentally pushed one of the buttons on the remote – ”  
  
“Oh my god.”  
  
“That’s exactly what  _she_  said.  Along with a few other things.  But louder.”  
  
“But she – she must have understood it was an accident . . .”  
  
“Well, the first time was.”  
  
“I’m . . . I am  _not_  listening to this.”  
  
“Good.  Because I’m hiding now.”  
  
He slipped through the balcony door, and Wilson took a few moments to carefully adjust the vertical blinds in such a way that it would seem to anyone who entered that he was trying to get the maximum light on his desk without allowing the sun to blaze directly in.  The angle  made the corner of the balcony where House was sitting completely invisible to anyone inside his office.   Finished, he sat down and returned to his paperwork.  He was diligently signing off on insurance forms when Cuddy walked through his office door without bothering to knock.  
  
“Where is he?”  
  
“He . . . you mean House?  I have no idea – did you try his office?”  
  
“No, because he’s not going to be there.  And don’t bother protecting him.  Where did he go?”  
  
“I haven’t seen him in awhile.” Technically, this was true: five minutes was a “while”.  “If he has a case, you could try paging him.”  
  
Cuddy folded her arms and stared at him.  “He doesn’t have a case.  What he  _does_  have is a potential lawsuit. I need him to get down to the clinic,  _right now_ , and at least  _pretend_  to apologize for what he’s done.  Now, where is he?”  
  
“Lisa, whatever this is, I’m sure – ”  
  
“Dr. Wilson, listen to me carefully, because I have two words for you.  _Remote. Control_.”  
  
Before he could stop himself, his lips twitched.  
  
“I knew it,” Cuddy said, and started around his desk toward the balcony door.  Wilson, alarmed, stood up so quickly his office chair shot backwards, bounced off the credenza  behind him and caromed back, hitting him behind the knees just hard enough to make him lose his balance and topple backwards.  There was a confused moment when everything seemed to be happening in slow motion, and then a kind of crashing thud as both chair and Wilson fell over, effectually blocking the door, with Cuddy just managing to stop herself from tripping over them by grabbing the corner of the desk for support.    
  
Wilson, dazed, stared up at her for a moment, then tried to scramble to his feet, risking a quick glance between the wildly swaying blinds as he did so.  There was no sign of House, but the balcony door to Diagnostics finished closing just as Wilson looked at it.  Then the chair was somehow entangling itself with his legs, and he was falling again.  
  
This time, when he landed, he lay still, trying to ignore the sharp, stabbing pain in his shoulder and neck.  Bruised collarbone, he mused, or possibly even a partial fracture.  Cuddy merely gave him a disgusted glance before heading back out his office door.    
  
House was probably doomed – there was no way he could move fast enough to evade Cuddy at this point.  And while this time House clearly deserved whatever it was he was going to get, Wilson was still able to feel a certain amount of sympathy for his friend, who seemingly hadn’t fully realized all the changes his new relationship might bring to his formerly free-wheeling ways.  
  
Groaning, Wilson hauled himself to his feet, grateful that at least the damaged collarbone was on his right side and not his left.  He thought about heading to Emergency to ask for a sling, but then decided he might as well go to the Clinic.  It was closer.     
  
And with any luck, he might make it there in time to hear just how House managed to word that particular apology.

 


End file.
